Texas Mountains

Excerpt |Texas Ranges Texas Monthly Feature, November 2001 For most of their lives, senior editor Joe Nick Patoski and freelance photographer Laurence Parent have explored and chronicled the mountains of the Trans-Pecos. In this excerpt from their forthcoming book, Texas Mountains, they show and tell where their love of the outdoors is at its peak.

Texas Mountains University of Texas Press In this book, Laurence Parent and Joe Nick Patoski join forces to offer breathtaking views of the Texas mountains. With magnificent images and words, they take us on a journey not only through the familiar Guadalupe, Davis, and Chisos mountains, but also through lesser-known ranges with evocative names such as Sierra Diablo, Eagle, Chinati, Beach, and Christmas.

Amazon.com: Books: Texas MountainsA Magical BookDecember 9, 2002 Reviewer: A reader from Dallas, TX "I’m a photographer not easily impressed. This book is simply the best rendering of this breathtaking, little known part of Texas that I’ve seen. The essay is well written and together with the photography makes for a classic."

Pages as Presents by Dan Oko December 7, 2001 These almost-too-gorgeous photos transcend the prettiness of postcards; the 10-by-11-inch, coffeetable format allows Parent to effectively hint at the scale of the landscape. By contrast, Patoski applies most of his able-bodied prose to the job of documenting the ranchers, restaurateurs, teachers, and scientists who people West Texas. Parent’s full-color photographs, capturing the many moods of the Texas highlands — rich tableaus of various ranges, valleys, and stony outcroppings documented in an array of seasons and under a variety of conditions. Patoski describes them as “a stone freak show of weird globs, jagged spires, gravity-defying balancing acts, marbled swirls, scoops of melted ice cream, and dribbled sandcastles that vary wildly from extraterrestrial to lunar in appearance.”

Amarillo Globe-News December 9, 2001 Takes the reader on a tour of some of the most magnificent views in Texas. Prepare to visit well-known sites in the Guadalupe, Davis, and Chisos Mountains and also less familiar but equally impressive views in areas identified as Sierra Diablo, Eagle, Chinati, and Christmas. In words and pictures, the book captures its subjects at all times of the day – dawn to dusk – and all seasons, summer drought to winter snow. Patoski’s “field notes” are enlightening. According to the publisher, the work by Parent, Austin free-lance photographer, and Patoski, a senior editor of Texas Monthly, produces a result that is as close to being there as you can get without endless driving across the daunting distances of the Lone Star State.

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